Like Encouragement And Gratitude, But Spendable
Yes, it’s time to remind patrons that where you are right now is made possible by the kindness of strangers. If you’d like to ensure this place exists a while longer, and remains ad-free, there are three buttons below the fold with which to monetise any love. Debit and credit cards are accepted. If what happens here is of value, this is a chance to show it.
If one-click haste is called for, there’s a QR code in the sidebar, at which you point your phone camera, and my PayPal.Me page can be found here. As requested, there are SubscribeStar and Ko-Fi accounts, via which love may also be monetised, whether as one-off donations or monthly subscriptions. Should you be gripped by an urge to express encouragement via currency, by all means succumb.
Additionally, any Amazon UK shopping done via this link, or via the button in the sidebar, results in a small fee for your host at no extra cost to you.
It’s what keeps this place here.
For newcomers wishing to know more about what’s been going on here for the last eighteen years, in over 3,000 posts and 200,000 comments, the Reheated series is a pretty good place to start – in particular, the end-of-year summaries, which convey the fullest flavour of what it is we do. A sort of blog concentrate. If you like what you find there… well, there’s lots more of that.
Do take a moment to poke through the discussion threads too. The posts are intended as starting points, not full stops, and the comments are where much of the good stuff is waiting to be found. And do please join in.
As always, thanks for the support, the comments, and the company.
Oh, and consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.
Have some encouragement.
Bless you, sir. Should you be chopping chillies and feel an urge to pee, may you remember to wash your hands very thoroughly before doing so.
Pinged.👍
Thanks, o gracious host. Ping!
Bless you, sirs. May your butter dish not need cleaning.
#TrueLifeDrama
*clears bar tab*
Cheers barkeep. Thanks for the laughs.
Ping. 🍷
Pinged. Gets some new noserings for the henchlesbians.
Noserings For Henchlesbians. Album name.
Bless you, sirs. Should you attend a Beloved Brother-In-Law’s birthday barbecue, teeming with strangers and people who haven’t seen each other in many years, may you experience the surrealism of some unfamiliar bloke coming over and saying, quite confidently, “Hiya Chris, haven’t seen you in ages,” because they’ve mistaken you for an entirely different person. Specifically, your Other Half.
#TrueStory
Here you go barman, in honour of Simcoe Day here.
I’m assuming you sacrifice an ox or something. And bless you, sir. May your behind-the-sofa cables never confound your robot vacuum cleaner, resulting in beeping and whirring and repeated phone notifications.
Our victim classes, displaying their true nature.
Our betters, displaying their virtue.
Both those links produce message that says
“Due to local laws, we are temporarily restricting access to this content until X estimates your age. Learn more“
If it’s any comfort, Dicentra’s work computer is convinced this place is pornographic.
I’m using a VPN, which should be telling X that I’m in Boston, USA. 🙁
If the links are to replies, X may be restricting access unless you have an X account.
My links? Actually one link, broken onto two lines for rhetorical purposes.
If I try to open that tweet in another browser which does not know about my X account, I see this message:
Are you in the UK? Could X be obeying an EU/UK order to block VPN access?
Is the entire X account blocked, or only that tweet?\
The tweet’s caption:
The gay dude is wearing a thong displaying his ass cheeks and some sort of chest halter. Because nothing says “I deserve respect as a serious adult” like going almost naked in public wearing fetish gear.
It’s not a reply.
The new hotness: gaslighting people with Alzheimer’s:
Because priorities. And adding to the confusion of an already confused person – by telling them that a man is somehow a woman – is now a vital part of healthcare, apparently.
Is this a recent development? Was access fine until now?
Choices were made.
Yes, but are you diverse…?
Regarding David’s Amazon link;
As I have discovered sometimes there are things not available on this side of the pond but can be had for slightly more shipping fees. #supportthestruggle
Meanwhile, Table Manners For The 21st Century, a play in two acts:
Act 1: Wypipo, am I rite?
Act 2: Nom, nom, nom.
Slightly related, in Petaluma a funeral service of note. Off key note, though.
Who can answer in the affirmative: “My name is legion.”
What I get, whether signed on or not, using UK or USA, is:
“Due to local laws, we are temporarily restricting access to this content until X estimates your age. Learn more”
and a reply from @alienonomy, saying “this guy couldn’t believe his eyes”, with a picture of the back of a bald head, a bloke I don’t recognise, and someone in the background taking a photo.
I was thinking about this claim that it is bigotry to discriminate against the mentally ill. Here are some examples of where pilot suicides (an illness for sure) killed entire planefuls: german pilot in EU flew plane into mountain (10 yrs ago?); egyptian pilot dove into atlantic; malaysian pilot vanished into Indian ocean; recent crash in India the pilot shut off fuel to engines while taking off, all but 1 killed. On the other hand, 3 of these IIRC were moslem, so maybe not suicide…
We can add the cost of incompetence: door blew off boeing. Plane flipped over in Canada.
And let’s check in on the not-at-all-unbalanced Democratic Socialists of America:
Ah. Okay, then.
Everyone who makes that assertion is either insane or deeply evil.
…Either way, they
shouldneed to be discriminated against.…not-at-all-unbalanced…
All wearing masks.
“Democratic Socialists” are Stalinists wearing smiley face masks. Monsters pretending to be human beings.
Seattle University law professor, a woman who pretends to be a man, calls for lawbreaking.
Note, further down the thread, the wink-wink endorsement by Laura Flanders, whose show airs on PBS.
Thank you, David. Consider your tip jar hit.
Bless you, sirs. Mere hours after a visit from the window cleaner, may you not discover that a previously glistening window is now adorned with a large, quite striking, deposit of bird shit.
And thanks to all who’ve chipped in so far, or subscribed, or done shopping via the Amazon link – including all those much too shy to say hello. I sometimes forget how many of you are lurking in the bushes, being very, very quiet.
It’s much appreciated and is what keeps this place here.
I’ll just leave this here, I think:
Now that you’ve booked your flight and are pretty much locked in, just how inclusive do you feel like being?
For those who missed it:
To enable extra commenting options – including @username mentions, comment editing, upvotes, custom avatars, and live notifications – scroll down to the black ‘Meta’ box at the very bottom of the page and click register. It’s free and quite painless.
Oh, and you can, should you wish, follow me on X.
True story? 🔥🌶️
And PING
Bless you, sir. May your shaver be charged and your razor sharp.
[ Peers over spectacles. ]
Heh.
Choices were made.
Ye gods, man – a little warning please!! I know, no refunds, credit note only, but a bridge troll ahead note would not have been amiss.
A Jesuit university, no less.
Tsk. And where’s the fun in that?
A dramatic shift in public opinion
This is happening because the people in charge want it to happen.
Ker-ching!
Harry Potter extra?
Bless you, sir. May your white shirt be free of tiny but deeply irritating arrabbiatta sauce splashes.
[ In background, whirr of washing machine. ]
What good are Jesuits if they repeatedly allow evil to infiltrate their institutions?
JK Rowling weighs in.
From her comments:
Heh.
From JK Rowling weighs in link:
I cannot for the life of me understand why anyone would believe that. The concept is so incredibly stupid. You’re going to introduce chemicals into children during their most dynamic and complicated stage of development to block said development but you can also turn that back on again. Like a light switch. How could anyone with an ounce of understanding of human biology believe that? And biiiiiig assumption that it would work just like that…big, BIG assumption…what did they think the developmental progress, social, intellectual, even biological would be? It’s one of these ideas that I had seen and heard from somewhat rational people. Even a couple that I (used to) know. It is absolutely stunning to me that one should be expected to take anyone that gullible seriously. I still have a hard time taking seriously anyone who took those people even remotely seriously seriously. Seriously.